An OldFashioned Romance
by ElapsedSpiralling
Summary: "They've all got a plan and mostly, it's the same: get famous and get rich. " - Awful summary but there's so little plot that anything more will explain away the whole fic. Azzarello!Joker  aka very gangster . Nudity, language. Unbeta'd.


**An Old-Fashioned Romance**

They've all got a plan and mostly, it's the same: get famous and get rich. There's variations as to how: modelling, singing, dancing, acting. A few are more "realistic" and shoot for being a Bunny. He finds it hilarious that he's never had a girl ring in to quit and hang up their pasties. Hell, the only people who have rung up have been cops to say they've matched dental records and Sally or Molly or Minnie or Penny is never coming back to work. Pretty fucking funny.

"What?" he asks. He even props himself up at something closer to a 90 degrees angle on the bar top to fix Sam with a squinted eyed frown. The barkeep stops being triplets and settles on being swaying, blurred twins instead.

"I said psychologist. Or psychiatrist. I never knew the difference," the man places a "polished" glass, polished to a stormy, murky grey, back on one shelf.

"Course not Sammy, you're thick as fuck," he slurs, affably, but goes on frowning and studying the man meditatively amidst the pirate-ship sway of the world, "She's a-, she's, what?"

"Psychologist. She's in school," Sam insisted, "Really. I've seen her doing her homework in the back."

It takes a good minute for the owner of the establishment to take his eyes off the drinks cabinet, frowning at each of the warm, inviting and glowing brown liquor bottles before he simply slides, liquid off his bar stool. He takes a moment to find his centre of gravity, smoothing his waistcoat and then moving off through the club. Consisting more of alcohol than water did nothing to prevent the man navigating the tables, stools and miniature stages dotted across the club's length. They were his world, a small part of his little kingdom that smelled of regret, cigars and broken marriages.

He's at the "dressing room" door (it's more like a bathroom) in a matter of seconds.

"Which is it?" he asks a reflection.

"What?" a cool, vacant voice asks.

"Which is it?"

He gets the room into focus and his mouth falls open like his jaw's been knocked loose. He's always had a thing for blondes. Monroe, Bardot, his childhood neighbour who never closed the curtains properly at night. But she's _so_ blonde and _so_ young and her waist is small enough to slip a necklace about it. Meekly, his eyes pan up to a pair of ocean blue eyes that make his own water, salty and stinging.

"What, is what?" the girl repeats and he stands up straighter, giving up on resting against the door frame with an apologetic swallow against the dryness in his mouth. She meets his eyes and getting those big blues without any dilution through a mirror's reflection is enough to give him palpitations.

"…You do psychology? Or the," he fumbles, messes with his gloves instead. He takes one off only to pull it back on, then flop onto a chair strewn with sweaty pantyhose, "The other one?"

"I'm a psychologist, in training," the girl agrees. She wipes rose-red lipstick from her lips with a cloth. Her own dusky lips are still stained with streaks of scarlet like the girl's been sipping wine. He watches it all intently, sobering with the study of her.

"Huh," he offers, for something to say. The gloves stay off this time. When she continues to focus her attention on her ministrations in removing her make up, he throws out his legs further, sloping on the chair and crossing his Oxfords.

"You do know who I am, dontcha?"

"Yes," her answer is instant but bored. His eyebrows rise and he hears a good dozen very tired, very typical threats form in his brain whilst his hand twitches with the reflex to slap the bitch. But he just smiles and stares widely at her.

"So," he gives his lip a gnaw, undoubtedly staining his own teeth with the smudge of lipstick on his mouth, "S'there anything can be done for me?"

That, apparently, gets her attention and she finally places the make-up stained cloth, all reds, whites and blacks, on one pitted sink edge. She comes to stand by his side, looking down at him through heavy lidded eyes, eyes that mascara slithers and speckles of eye liner still cling to.

"What does that mean?"

He pulls a face and shrugs. His centre of gravity shifts and he's sent leaning towards her, like she has a pull that's drawing him in. He lets it happen and finds himself in close proximity to breasts, to smooth, young peach skin and the smell of cheap, lemony shower gel. Casting his eyes up all he sees is smooth shoulder, bare breast, a nipple that is slightly tightened and rosy with the cold and the attention. His foot taps with interest.

"Well, they says I'm not quite," he smiles wider and feels the old scars pull, falter, tug at his ears, "One piece," he tapped one temple with a bare finger, "You know, up here?"

"I don't know about that," the girl mutters. Her hands work down the little latex panties she's been wearing and she's left there beside him, just warm and moist and close and he closes his eyes, enjoying the little paradise he's found in the back of such an unsuspecting shit-hole in Gotham's most toxic zip code, "I've not finished studying mental illness yet-"

Will you ever, he wonders. And if not, why not?

"But you've probably got Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from getting those scars," she says and he's treated to a little petting on his crown. He lets his head waggle like he's a puppy getting praise. After a beat he cracks his eyes open to add, wailing.

"Oh, poor me! I'm so shook up! No wonder I've got to rob banks! Least I'll know what to tell the judge next time," he chokes on a momentary sob, "I'm just the victim after all!"

Her laughter is a rattle, tinny and ugly. He enjoys the contrast with the pert breasts, the smooth folds between firm thighs.

"You're funny sweetie," she says, when they subside. And with that, he knows he has her. Some guys had their looks, he has his gags and she's rattling and squeaky along to them like an idiotic laugh shack crowd.

"So, Miss Harley," he makes little motorbike revving gestures and gets another laugh from her for his efforts. One raised hand winds up stroking a hip and remains there. She either doesn't notice or doesn't care – good enough, "Tell me…how'd you like to be my little doctor-in-residence?"

It was a strange start to the romance of the century but then so was he and so was she if this was her first idea of how to pay for school tuition. He might have taken her out for a meal, might have eaten her out, might have beaten her up and into submission but no. Little Miss Harley stood over him, casting a thin, skinny shadow over his weathered, wearied face. He kept stroking the soft skin of her thigh with the dry pad of his thumb. His doctor-in-residence to be. His little walking, talking prescription pad to be. His Bardot, Monroe, blonde-r than blonde doll, moll, beauty.

"This," he says and he gets such amazing chills from the bullshit he comes out with when he's drunk that he actually physically trembles, "This is going to be the start of something beautiful, Mrs Napier."

The girl's sent rattling even harder, like the teeth are threatening to fly out of her mouth with her laughter. And then he's sent laughing louder still at the thought that maybe, just maybe one day her teeth really will be sent on an impressive arc out of their parent jaw. Or maybe they'll be matched to dental records by the GCPD.

"Get dressed Mrs Napier," Joker mumbles against her extra rib before leaving a sloppy, lipsticked kiss there, "I've got to introduce you to this friend of mine…"


End file.
